10 and 2
If this blog had sponsors, tonight's blog would be brought to you by anxiety. And white wine. Today wasn't for the faint of heart. It was for people who like 5,243,920 small details and here's a hint: I'm a big picture person. Glenn, the Director-Of-All-Things-Construction, made TREMENDOUS progress on PJP Buttonwood on Friday. We had an amazing party there on Saturday (more on that later) and then yesterday, we worked on assembling shelving and bringing in retail items for organization. The space felt like it was coming together in a significant way that allowed me to relax and focus all my attention on Don Draper at 9 pm last evening.
Today? PJP looked like a war zone. It was a flurry of activity to complete things I would have never even thought about doing. Let me say again with full humility that if you are ever considering contracting your own commercial space, IT IS A JOB LEFT TO THE EXPERTS. Find someone as awesome as Susan and Wayne and Glenn and just do whatever they tell you to do. They know about fire extinguisher rules, signs that say "this door must remain unlocked during business hours", and what to do with 5 gallon bucks of hydraulic oil.
They also know about GFI plug requirements, how to whip up some shelves for under the front counter super quick, and know me well enough to know that it would take them saying "get a painter for that back wall NOW" for it to happen. Sometimes both Jeanne and I need to hear the reality of a situation.
I texted Dennis Hill from Hill Painting. I think that after someone paints your walls after you've used 10 cans of spray adhesive glue on them, you are de facto texting official. Here is how the exchange went down:
Me: Dennis, it is Rebecca. I have a painting emergency. Can you paint the back concrete wall with block filler and washable paint and be all finished by 2 pm tomorrow?
Dennis: We r finishing a basement this morning will try to put block filler on this afternoon then paint in the morning. R u going to be there after lunch
Me: I love you. What do you need from me?
Dennis: Do you have block filler?
Me: Uh...no. What does it look like exactly?
Dennis: I'll just go to Sherwin Williams
At this point in the game, clearly all of my self-pride and tact have completely gone out the window. I'm reduced to begging via iMessage and throwing out "I love you" to painters I've met once.
Tomorrow is the day for all the inspections you can ever imagine. I feel like I need a dress, four inch heels, and a clipboard to express my worthiness to the City of Columbia Health Department and the City of Columbia Building Inspector. (As an aside, I took my drivers license test on the day I turned 16 and it was really cold out. I turned the heaters up in Jeanne's Honda Civic and then the car turned into an inferno of full blasting heat and I was too afraid to turn it down because that would require I take my hands off 10 and 2 on the wheel and I worried I would flunk. So really I just sweated it up with a random DMV guy like we were in an awkward sauna. I still failed because no 16 year old adequately parallel parks.)
As of tonight. Director-Of-All-Things-Construction Glenn says Thursday looks to be THE OPENING DAY. Would it be over the top if I had trumpeters to announce our door openings. Because doesn't it feel that way by now? I would break a bottle of champagne against the front door, but I bet the health department has a rule about pouring champagne out on a porous surface. And I have a rule about wasting perfectly good champagne.
So put it on your calendar to see us Thursday. I'll put it on my clipboard.